


life is what happens

by waveydnp



Series: waveydaysFICS [2]
Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: But here it is, Established Relationship, Fluff, M/M, Parent Phan, bet you never thought you'd see that in a dnp fic, just a little bit, labour and delivery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-15
Updated: 2017-09-15
Packaged: 2018-12-30 03:14:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,785
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12099492
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/waveydnp/pseuds/waveydnp
Summary: in which dan and phil await the birth of their first child





	life is what happens

**Author's Note:**

> week #2: parent phan
> 
> go check out ashley's parent fic @iihappydaysii
> 
> warning: this story is about birth. i tried not to make it too graphic, but if you are especially squeamish you may want to proceed with caution.
> 
> this is very different from anything i've ever written or read in this fandom, but as a someone who's given birth twice and whose dream career is midwifery, i really loved writing this and it came out very personal, as fic always tends to do. i hope you enjoy my take on parent phan.
> 
> title is from john lennon's song beautiful boy

Phil’s ass is sore. He shifts his body, trying desperately to relieve the pressure but he knows it’s no use. He’s been sitting in this chair for hours, waiting. Just waiting. Everything is quiet save for the occasional beep of the heart rate monitor.

Dan sits in a similarly uncomfortable chair across the room, though he’s somehow managed to fall asleep in it. His elbow rests on the arm of the chair, his fist digging into his cheek, keeping his neck from bowing with the weight of his head. His mouth is hanging open slightly, releasing soft little snores with every exhalation. His curls are a wild, fluffy mess atop his head. He looks as wrecked as Phil feels, already. They haven’t even gotten to the hard part yet.

Phil releases the soft warm hand wrapped around his and stands up. “Sorry, need to stretch my legs. I’ll be right back, ok? Yell if… well, if anything.”

Her small, tired voice replies, “I will, Phil. Don’t worry.”

He walks around the bed and over to his sleeping partner, placing his hand on his shoulder and whispering, “Dan, wake up.”

Dan startles. “Hm, what? What’s wrong?”

Phil squeezes his shoulder reassuringly. “Nothing. I’m going for a little walk. Want a coffee?”

Dan sits up straighter, rubs his eyes. “Yeah, please.” He looks over at the woman reclined in the angled bed. “I’m so sorry. I can’t believe I fell asleep like an asshole.”

Her laughter is breathy and quiet, and the smile she gives him is warm, dimpling her cheeks and brightening her hazy green eyes. Her long strawberry blonde hair is fanned out like a halo against the pillow. “It’s fine, Dan. Nothing much is happening yet and Phil’s been holding my hand the whole time. He’s going to be a great dad. You both are.”

Phil’s heartbeat kicks up a little at that. It still doesn’t feel altogether real. He feels Dan’s palm stroke lightly down his forearm. “He is,” Dan says softly.

“Besides, you need all the sleep you can get now.”

Dan stands up and takes a few steps towards the bed, smiling. He reaches out and splays his long fingers tenderly against her swollen belly. “How’re you feeling?”

“Tired, mostly.”

Dan looks over at Phil. “No contractions?”

Phil shakes his head.

She puts her hand overtop Dan’s. “It can take a while. Everything’s fine.”

“Yeah, of course,” Dan agrees quickly, but Phil can tell from his tone that he doesn’t fully believe her.

Just then, there’s a light knock on the door. A midwife walks in and says, “Hi, Natalie. How’s everything going in here? Any change?”

She smiles tiredly and shakes her head. “Not really.”

“Is it supposed to take this long?” Dan interjects. “Shouldn’t she be having contractions by now?”

“Dan,” Phil whispers reproachfully.

“It’s ok.” Natalie looks at Phil kindly, reassuring him with a little smile. The three of them have spent enough time together in the last eight months—she’s come to recognize Dan’s anxious reaction to uncertainty.

The midwife is crouched down beside the bed, carefully studying a long sheet of paper that slowly uncurls from the machine that attaches to the monitor wrapped around Natalie’s rounded stomach. “Actually,” she says, ripping a section of the paper off as she stands up. She points out some jagged lines graphed along the page and says, “She _is_ contracting, about every half hour or so.”

“But she can’t feel them,” Dan argues.

“That’s how it starts, love. It’s not like the movies.”

Dan rubs harshly at the sparse stubble that dots his jaw. “But I thought this was different, since she’s been induced… The doctor said it would be more intense than a…” he looks over at Phil helplessly.

“Spontaneous labour,” Phil finishes for him. He looks at Natalie apologetically. He thinks it can’t be easy for her to hear a room full of people standing over her and discussing the levels of pain she’ll be experiencing before long.

The midwife frowns a little, shaking her head. “She shouldn’t have said that. I’m sure you’ve noticed this by now, but doctors don’t always think about what they say before they say it.”

“So it’s not going to hurt?” Dan sounds so childlike, so hopeful. It breaks Phil’s heart a little. Loving Dan so hopelessly for so long has meant growing accustomed to being broken apart and put back together in a million tiny ways every day—right now because Dan’s so desperate to believe that this lovely woman won’t experience any pain bringing his and Phil’s child into the world.

Natalie reaches out and squeezes Dan’s hand.

Phil doesn’t miss the midwife’s uneasy expression. “Maybe we should just… step outside,” he mumbles.

Natalie shakes her head. “It’s fine, Phil. You know this isn’t my first time.” She looks at Dan. “It’s going to hurt. But that’s ok. I can handle it.”

“She won’t have to handle it.” The midwife wraps a blood pressure cuff around Natalie’s arm. “There are lots of pain relief options available to her.”

Dan frowns and begins to open his mouth, no doubt to worry about something else, so Phil cuts him off quickly, “Dan. Let’s go get a coffee, yeah?”

“But…” He looks down at Natalie.

“Dan. It’s alright,” she laughs. “Go. Get a coffee. Stretch your legs. Take some deep breaths. I’ll still be here when you get back, probably still hungry and bored as hell.”

*

They’ve relocated to different yet equally uncomfortable chairs in the waiting room of the maternity ward. The chairs are small, too small for their long legs. They’re sipping thin, bitter coffee and staring off into the distance silently, both apparently lost in thought. Phil turns his head to look at Dan. Despite all Natalie’s assurances, he knows Dan is still incredibly nervous and uneasy. Phil feels it too, but he’s always been better at hiding it.

He reaches out and squeezes Dan’s thigh. It’s more contact than he’d usually allow himself in a public place, but the waiting room is quiet and not likely to be harbouring any fans. They don’t hide it as they once did, but Phil in particular still feels a fierce protectiveness over the life he shares with Dan.

He wants to tell Dan not to worry, that there really isn’t anything to worry about, but he knows Dan will see through him instantly—he’s scared too. Scared of the birth yes, and all the myriad ways things could go wrong, but also scared for the monumental shift that’s about to take place if things _don’t_ go wrong.

Dan smiles weakly. “We should get back.”

“It’s only been five minutes. She probably wants some time away from us.”

Dan is quiet for a long time before he says, “Are we ready?”

Phil sighs, leaning his head back against the wall, looking up at the ceiling. “I don’t know.”

Dan huffs out a surprised laugh. “Not really the answer I was looking for…”

Phil rubs his eyes. “I know. Sorry. I didn’t really mean it.” He turns his head in Dan’s direction again. He’s slumped in his chair, the ankle of one leg resting on the knee of the other. He’s wearing snug black sweatpants and that pale pink jumper Phil had bought him for their pastel edits video all those years ago. His face has a few more lines than it used to, the little creases around his eyes and mouth evidence of nearly two decades of life and laughter together. “I think we’re as ready as we can be for something you can never _really_ be ready for.”

Dan nods. “I didn’t think I’d be this scared,” He says quietly. “I’ve wanted this for so long.”

Phil swallows against the sudden lump in his throat. “I know.” He reaches out and lifts Dan’s face up gently under the chin, looking into his deep brown eyes. He doesn’t need to say anything else.

*

“Are you sure you’re alright?” Phil’s voice is tight. Natalie’s hand grips Phil’s forearm as she shuffles slowly down the hall of the maternity ward. “We can go back…”

“I’m fine,” she assures, no doubt growing tired of repeating those words. The hand not holding onto Phil is wrapped around a wheeled metal pole, off of which hang multiple clear plastic bags of liquid attached via tubes to the IV in the back of her hand. She really is a sight to behold, Phil thinks, her small frame draped in the pale blue of the hospital gown, her abdomen ballooning out in front of her. There is a slight waddle to her gait as she puts one slippered foot in front of the other. “Walking helps speed things along and once it really gets going I won’t be able to anymore so I want to take advantage.”

Phil nods. “Sorry. And sorry about Dan. He’s a worrier. We both are, I guess, in our own ways…”

“I know. I get it. It’s kind of a terrifying thing.”

“Yeah,” he agrees. “It feels a little surreal that we’re here now, already. It’s felt so quick.”

She laughs then, high and melodic like wind chimes. “Really? Feels like it’s been a hundred years for me.”

“Ahh, right, sorry,” Phil mumbles. “I guess I’m not the one who has to feel… everything.”

She opens her mouth to respond, but suddenly a frown overtakes her delicate features and her breath seemingly rushes out. She squeezes her eyes shut and hangs her head down, hand gripping Phil’s wrist so tightly that it actually hurts a little. Phil hears her breathing in and out deliberately, methodically, and somehow has the presence of mind not to panic—she’s having a contraction, a real one.

It’s probably only twenty seconds later that her grip eases and she lifts her head, but to Phil it feels like an eternity. “Alright?” he asks.

She nods, smiling. “I told you, the walking really works.”

*

“About… three centimeters,” the midwife says, retracting her arm from between Natalie’s open legs.

Natalie sighs in relief and releases her tight grip on Dan’s hand as the midwife rises from the bed and pulls off her glove. Phil releases the breath he’d been holding. No matter how many times he’s seen it happen today alone, he’ll never grow used to the shocking lack of privacy this woman is enduring, and all for two men she hardly knows.

“Is that good?” Dan asks. Phil sighs internally. He knows Dan knows the answer—he knows because they’d read all the books, together. They’d watched countless birth videos and checked out multiple birth centres and attended every single one of Natalie’s many appointments, but fear and stress have apparently erased all that research from Dan’s frazzled memory.

“It’s not good or bad,” the midwife says diplomatically. “Every labour progresses differently.”

“It means I still have seven more centimeters to go,” Natalie interjects, and Phil thinks he hears the beginnings of a crack in her so far unwavering level of positivity.

“But it’s been almost a full day already,” Dan says.

“Dan.” Phil’s voice is stern. This time, there are no assurances from Natalie. Her head rests on her pillow and her eyes are closed, like she’s trying to block them out. Phil doesn’t blame her.

“She could progress to ten centimeters in a few hours,” the midwife says, scribbling notes on the clipboard in her hand. “That’s what makes labour and delivery such a beautiful and thrilling experience—it’s unpredictable.”

Natalie snorts. “I bet you say that to all the girls.”

The midwife smiles, squeezing her shoulder. “I do. And they never agree with me until after the fact.” She leans down and whispers in Natalie’s ear theatrically, “I’m trying to make these boys feel better. Have you noticed how terrified they are?”

“Yeah. They’re just giant teddy bears.”

*

“Breathe, love, just breathe. In through the nose, out through the mouth. Focus. Focus on the breathing. I know it’s hard, but try to relax. It’ll take longer to open up if you’re tensing. That’s it, just breathe.” The midwife keeps coming in and out of the bathroom, quietly murmuring praise and instruction in equal measure.

Natalie is lying face-up in the bathtub, eyes squeezed shut, a white towel laid across her breasts. Her belly rises up out of the shallow water, a perfectly round island of pale, stretched skin. Her eyes shoot daggers at the midwife when she opens them, but Phil can see that she’s trying to do as she says. Dan is kneeling on the floor by the edge of the tub, stroking the damp strands of pale red hair off her forehead.

The midwife had been right—Natalie’s contractions had gone from naught to agonizing in about an hour. It seems to Phil that they’re coming only a minute or two apart and lasting longer than she can bear. Her hands are balled up into fists below the water, her toes curling with every contraction. Phil stands a little ways back, watching Dan hover, watching him caress Natalie’s temple so gently with his big delicate hand. He watches Dan’s hands and takes deep breaths himself, trying to swallow back the nausea that lurches in his stomach every time he hears her whimper, “No, no, no, no, I can’t do it, I can’t do it.”

The next time the midwife enters the bathroom Phil stops her and whispers, “Can’t you do anything? I thought the water was supposed to help.”

“Every labour is different. What works for one woman may not work for another. But there are other options. We usually like to wait for the patient to ask for them…”

Phil frowns. “Can you at least remind her about those options?”

The midwife nods, kneeling next to Dan and speaking softly to Natalie in between contractions. “I think it might be time to talk about pain relief, love.”

Natalie shakes her head. Her eyes are still screwed shut and she’s chewing her bottom lip distractedly. Phil wonders if she’s even really heard what the midwife said.

The midwife continues, “I don’t mean to alarm you, but it’s probably still early on and these sensations are only going to get stronger.”

“I don’t want an epidural,” Natalie spits through gritted teeth.

“There are lots of things we can try before that. A lot of patients find relief with gas and air.”

Natalie doesn’t say anything, just begins whimpering again, a quiet, haunting chorus of “No, no, no,” and Phil’s stomach clenches again. He focuses on Dan’s face but that’s no good either—he looks absolutely terrified.

The midwife kneels down and places her hand low on Natalie’s belly, then pulls the stethoscope from around the back of her neck and places it where her hand had been. She listens for a minute before removing it and saying, “Heartbeat sounds good. Strong, healthy baby you’ve got in there.” Dan beams.

“Natalie, I know it’s difficult, but we’re going to get you up out of the tub now, alright love?” The midwife says, but she’s looking at Dan. Natalie starts whimpering again, protesting, but the midwife cuts her off gently. “We need to get you back to the bed while you can still walk.”

A shiver runs all the way down Phil’s spine. He watches in a daze as Dan and the midwife grip Natalie under her arms and essentially haul her up and out of the tub. He doesn’t even register that he should help, that Natalie is stood there stark naked and blue-lipped, shivering.

“Phil,” Dan says firmly. Phil’s head snaps in Dan’s direction. “Towel.”

Time seems to lose meaning for Phil. Everything feels cloudy, surreal. He wraps a towel around Natalie’s wet, trembling body and helps Dan get her back into bed. He watches her face contort in distress, feels her grip on his hand tighten with each new contraction. Later, he vaguely registers the midwife saying something to him, and presumably to Dan and Natalie as well, before putting on a glove and opening Natalie’s legs. He hears Natalie cry out as the midwife’s hand and wrist disappear inside her body, watches a slow steady stream of pink-tinged water spread across the pad underneath her.

After that, things get even more intense. Phil watches Natalie desperately suck the gas and air from an inhaler attached to a tube and sees that it brings her little relief. Eventually, the strength of the contractions becomes so intense that she can’t breathe through them—she can’t really breathe at all. She holds her breath and clenches her thighs and digs her nails into the flesh of Phil’s hands.

He looks over at Dan, who’s sat in one of those god-awful chairs on the other end of the room. He’s bent forward, head in his hands and that’s when Phil realizes he needs to snap out of it. Dan needs him now, and Natalie needs them both—and their unborn child needs Natalie.

He stands up and reaches out his long arm to press the big red button behind her bed, the one that sends the midwife running.

“What is it? What’s wrong?” She asks breathlessly.

Phil’s voice is clear and commanding. “She needs something stronger.”

The midwife reprimands Phil for using the emergency button but agrees that Natalie is no longer coping with just the gas and air. She’s been awake for over twenty-four hours and her stamina is waning rapidly. It takes both Phil and the midwife twenty minutes of reassurance and encouragement before she eventually agrees.

The wait for the anaesthesiologist is agonizing. Phil can tell from the jagged lines on the paper that prints from the monitor beside her bed that Natalie’s contractions continue to intensify, and yet it seems that the knowledge that she’ll soon feel relief affords her a resurgence of determination. She doesn’t cry anymore, her muscles don’t tense with the contractions. He watches her face in awe, squeezes her hand as she breathes and pants through the pain. He watches and can’t help but marvel at how breathtakingly beautiful she is in this moment, the strength in her furrowed brow, the resolve in the silent tears that stream down her freckled cheeks.

Dan is still sat in the corner of the room, wringing his hands, chewing his lip. Phil catches his eye and jerks his head, motioning for Dan to join him.

“You alright?” he asks, keeping his voice low.

Dan shakes his head.

“She’s ok. She’s getting the epidural. She’ll feel better soon.”

Dan covers his mouth with his hand, looking down at Natalie, pale-faced and wide-eyed.

“She’s ok, Dan,” Phil murmurs gently. “This is how it goes. We knew this was coming, remember?”

Dan nods. “Yeah, yeah, I know, I just… I didn’t…”

Phil reaches out with his free hand, sliding his fingers between Dan’s and squeezing, hard. “I know. Me neither. But it’s ok. Everything’s gonna be fine. You’re gonna be a dad soon.”

“ _We_ are.” The corners of Dan’s mouth quirk up just a little.

*

It’s quiet again—peaceful even. The sky is dark beyond the window, the lights in their room dimmed. Phil crinkles his nose as Dan shifts in his sleep, his dark curls tickling against Phil’s skin. He tightens his grip around Dan’s waist and buries his face even deeper in the fluffy hair. They’re spooned together tightly on a cot meant for one, wedged between the bed and the wall. Dan sighs sleepily. Phil can’t hear Natalie anymore, but he knows she’s asleep, has been since the delicious relief of the epidural. Phil is still struggling a little to comprehend the pain Natalie must have been experiencing to welcome a large need stuck straight into her spinal cord, but the effects had quickly proven undeniable. She could talk through the contractions, laugh at Phil’s weak attempts at jokes and eventually, close her eyes and get the rest her body desperately needs for the monumental task still to come.   

“Dan,” Phil whispers into his hair.

“Hmm?”

“We’re gonna have a baby soon.”

“I know,” Dan mumbles sleepily, and Phil knows he’s smiling. “It’s fucking crazy, right?”

“You can’t say stuff like that anymore,” Phil chuckles.

“They haven’t even come out yet. Let me get my last few curses in while I can.”

Phil nuzzles into Dan’s neck and murmurs against the soft skin. “I love you.”

“How inappropriate would it be if we made out right now, like just a little?”

Phil giggles. “Very.”

“Right,” Dan says, turning over and brushing Phil’s fringe off his forehead. He usually wears it in a quiff now, but sometimes it still seems determined to flop back over into the emo style he’d worn it in for so many years.

Dan presses his lips softly to Phil’s and it’s so warm and sweet and lovely after the nonstop tension and anxiety of the day. Phil moves his hands up and cups Dan’s jaw, brushing his fingertips against stubble that had only started growing within the last couple years.

Just as Phil feels Dan’s tongue brush against the inside of his lip, he hears Natalie’s quiet voice. “You boys better not be doing what I think you’re doing down there.”

Dan giggles as Phil jerks up into a sitting position. “We’re not.”

“Not anymore,” Dan says as he sits up. Phil shoves his shoulder playfully.

“Good,” Natalie says. “Baby girl doesn’t need to hear that.”

“You don’t know it’s a girl,” Dan says, standing up and relocating to the chair at the foot of Natalie’s bed.

“I do,” she says breezily. “I can feel it.”

Phil smiles. He doesn’t quite know what to make of Natalie’s insistence, but he does know that it annoys Dan no end and that’s what makes him smile. On the day of the anatomy scan, as soon as the ultrasound technician had asked if they wanted to know the sex of the baby, Dan had said, “No. It doesn’t matter to us.” Phil had known that Dan meant it, that this was one of those things he felt passionately about, all the way down to his bones. Their child would be raised the same, regardless of the parts they had and the arbitrary rules society would try to force on them.

And Phil agrees with him, one hundred percent—of course he does. But he’s never been as good at these things as Dan, the rejection of all the norms and expectations thrust upon him in his own life doesn’t come as naturally for him as it does for Dan. Maybe it’s because he’s a little older than Dan. Maybe it’s because he doesn’t feel the same innate desire to rebel against those norms that Dan does. Whatever the reason, he always finds himself agreeing with Dan, but usually after his own initial reactions have formed differently. He’d wanted to know if his child would be a boy or a girl. Of course, it doesn’t matter, it won’t change the devastation of the love he’ll feel for them, doesn’t change the way he’ll fight tooth and nail to make sure this child can be and do whatever they choose. It doesn’t matter, and he’ll never admit it out loud, but he’s wondered every day if he’ll be returning home with a son or a daughter.

“How’re you feeling?” Phil asks quietly, touching Natalie’s arm gently and taking a seat in the chair beside the head of the bed.

“Bloody amazing. I always forget how brilliant the epidural is. I don’t know why I fight it every time.”

“So you don’t feel anything?” Dan asks.

“I still feel it, it just doesn’t hurt anymore.”

“What does it feel like?” Phil asks, before he can stop himself.

She laughs. “Kind of like my belly is being squeezed in a vice.”

“Fuck,” Dan mutters.

“Oi,” Phil scolds. “No more of that, mister.”

Dan rolls his eyes. “They can’t hear me, Phil.”

“Actually, she can,” Natalie interjects. “Especially low pitched voices. You should talk to her. She’ll be able to recognize her daddies from the first.”

Phil’s heart kicks in his chest. _Daddies._

“Can she—they really?” Dan sounds surprised, even though Phil knows for a fact they’d read about that together. Apparently the stress is really affecting his memory.

Natalie nods. “Say something.”

Dan stands, walking over to stand beside the bed. He stretches out his fingers and lays those big hands against Natalie’s bump. “It’s so tight,” he exclaims, taken aback.

She laughs. “I’m having a contraction.”

“Should I wait?”

She nods. “She’s getting squeezed to hell right now, she won’t be able to hear you.”

Dan looks stricken. Phil feels it too. Reading the books obviously hadn’t properly prepared them for the quiet violence of labour.

Just then, there’s a knock on the door and a midwife, different from the first, enters the room.

“Tell these boys their baby is just fine please, won’t you?” Natalie says cheerfully. “I think I scared them a little.”

“Of course. Let’s just give you a quick check first.”

The midwife applies a glove and parts Natalie’s legs, but this time when the hand disappears inside her body, she is calm and relaxed. “Thank god for epidurals,” she muses.

The midwife removes her hand and smiles. “Good news. You’re just a hair off ten centimetres. I can feel the head and it’s nice and low. You’re going to have a baby very soon.”

Amidst all the excitement and celebration, Phil notes in the back of his mind that this midwife doesn’t do any of the other checks that the previous midwife had been doing religiously.

“Can I say something now?” Dan asks, bleary-eyed and drunk on the excitement of nine months of waiting finally nearing its end.

Natalie nods. Dan holds the sides of her belly and leans down so his lips are just an inch away. “Hi, baby. It’s me, your dad. I can’t wait to meet you. We’ve been waiting for you a long time.”

Phil’s chest tightens. He’s about to join Dan in introducing himself to their unborn child when a loud beeping like an alarm goes off on one of the machines next to Natalie’s bed.

Dan’s head snaps up. “What the fuck is that?”

Phil doesn’t have time to respond before five midwives come bursting through the door. He and Dan are all but shoved out of the way as the midwives start shouting instructions at each other and barking questions at Natalie. Dan’s frowning deeply, a hand over his mouth. Phil’s own hands are balled up into tight fists at his sides as they stand beside each other and watch the chaos unfold. Again, Phil’s mind slips a little from the terrifying reality unfolding in the small room. His vision blurs and his hearing dulls. He sees an oxygen mask appear over Natalie’s face. Her legs are splayed, her feet shoved unceremoniously into stirrups and her gown yanked up over her belly, leaving her utterly vulnerable and exposed. There are hands all over her and inside her, midwives and doctors keep coming in and out, running around the room and checking the monitors, stethoscopes and dopplers placed against Natalie’s skin, listening to her chest and her stomach in equal measure.

Phil hears bits and pieces but can’t connect them to each other, can’t make sense of what he’s hearing.

“Is she contracting right now?”

“It’s way too low.”

“Need to get it out immediately.”

“Natalie? Natalie. We need you to start pushing now, love, ok? We need to get this baby out as quickly as possible.”

Just as Phil feels himself about to check out completely, he sees Dan surge forward into the sea of medical professionals. “What’s going on?” he demands loudly.

“Are you the father?”

“Yes.”

Phil still doesn’t have the presence of mind to make it known that Dan is only one of the two fathers, just watches in terrified silence as Dan takes control for the both of them.

“The baby’s heart rate is slowing dramatically with each contraction. It’s possible that the umbilical cord is wrapped around its neck, but there’s no way to be certain until she births the head.”

“What if she can’t…” Dan stutters.

“We’re prepping an OR now. We want to try for a vaginal birth if possible because that’s always the safest way, but we don’t have a lot of time. We need to do this, right now. Alright?”

Dan nods. “What should I do?” he asks weakly.

“For now, go stand beside your wife and hold her hand.”

Dan splutters. “Oh, uh, actually she’s not—”

“We don’t have any time to waste sir, we need to do this. Your baby is not safe in there anymore.”

Dan blanches. He’s frozen again. Luckily, seeing Dan in distress always seems to bring out Phil’s bravery. He takes a few steps forward and says confidently, “Actually, he’s not Natalie’s husband, he’s mine. Natalie is our surrogate.” He walks over to stand beside her and takes her cold, clammy hand firmly in his. “What do you need me to do?”

To her credit, the midwife doesn’t miss a beat, just shifts her gaze from Dan to Phil and begins to instruct him on how to help Natalie give birth. “We need you to time the pushes for us.” She looks at Natalie. “You need to take a deep breath and hold it, put your chin to your chest and push, hard, as hard as you possibly can, for ten seconds at a time and then release that breath.” She looks back over to Phil. “You need to count for us, loudly, so everyone can hear.” She looks at Natalie again. “You need to keep doing that until the contraction passes. We need this baby out in as few pushes as possible, yeah?”

Natalie nods silently from behind the clear mask that covers her nose and mouth. She looks terrified. Phil leans down and whispers in her ear, “You can do it. Everything’s going to be alright.” He squeezes her hand. “No matter what happens, we’ll always be so grateful to you for giving us this chance.” He looks at her face and sees a tear slip through her eyelashes.

“Ok, Natalie, I think this is a contraction coming, are you ready?” The midwife is sat on a stool between Natalie’s leg.

She nods again.

“Deep breath… that’s it… chin to chest…” the midwife looks at Phil then. “Count to ten now.”

Phil starts counting.

“Push Natalie, push as hard as you bloody well can. Good, good, keep going, keep going, harder, harder, push through your bottom, that’s it, good, keep going love.”

“Nine… ten.” Phil hears Natalie’s muffled release of breath from behind her mask. Her face is red and she looks utterly exhausted already.

“Again,” the midwife says firmly and Phil starts over counting. He feels the bones and tendons in his hand pressing together painfully as Natalie squeezes with a vice-like grip, but he knows it’s absolutely nothing compared to what she’s going through. He focuses on counting, on watching her face. Nothing else matters right now, not the concerned faces of the other midwives or the alarming beeping of the machines or the nausea that threatens to overtake him when he thinks of how close they are to losing everything.

“Ten.” He feels the tension leave her hand temporarily as she releases her breath.

They continue this pattern four more times before the midwife says, “Ok, that one’s gone. You rest now, love, take deep breaths. It won’t be long ‘til the next one. You did brilliantly, baby’s head is much lower now already.”

Natalie collapses back on the bed and shuts her eyes. Phil doesn’t let go of her hand, but he doesn’t say anything to her. He can’t think of anything to say, really. He looks over at Dan, who’s still stood rooted in place near the back of the room. He’s white as a sheet.

“Dan. Dan.” Phil calls out to him, not as softly as he’d like because he really needs to snap him out of whatever nightmare-scape his mind has fallen into. “Dan!”

Dan’s head snaps in Phil’s direction. “What?”

“Hold her other hand,” Phil instructs, and Dan does. They look at each other from across the bed. “It’s gonna be alright,” Phil says again. “We can all do this. Ok?”

Dan nods. His big hand wraps tightly around Natalie’s. He looks down at her and says, “Sorry. Got scared. I’m such a twat.”

Phil is about to scold him when he hears Natalie give a pitiful little laugh.

“Here comes the next one,” the midwife warns.

Phil counts and Dan keeps his eyes locked on Natalie’s face and she crushes their hands and pushes harder and harder each time. The midwife lets out a steady stream of instruction and encouragement until the second contraction passes and Natalie collapses backwards again. “Fuck me, I’m bloody shattered,” she groans.

Dan and Phil look at each other in shock but the midwife laughs. “That’s because you’re pushing like a legend, love. I think you’ll birth the head with the next one. Do you want to feel?”

Natalie nods, eyes wide. She lets go of Dan’s hand and reaches down between her legs. Phil hears her gasp and sees another tear trail down her splotched red cheek. She looks at him and says with wonder, “I can feel her hair.”

Phil’s heart leaps up into his throat then as the realization hits—he’s going to be a father, soon. Maybe in just a few minutes.

The midwife looks at Dan. “Do you want to come over here and watch your child born?”

Dan nods and at that, Phil swears he feels his heart stop altogether. Dan joins the midwife at the foot of the bed and Phil watches his face intently. He covers his mouth with his hand. “Phil,” his voice is shaky. “Phil I can see her fu—I can see her head.” _Her._

Phil tries to reply, but it feels like there’s no air left in his lungs. His heart is hammering now, his stomach lurching.

“Here it comes, Natalie, ready?”

Phil starts counting and Natalie starts pushing, but this time Phil can’t take his eyes off Dan’s face.

Halfway to ten the midwife says, “Woah, woah, woah, ok Natalie, stop pushing, stop pushing love, I need you to pant now ok? Quick little breaths in and out.”

“I can’t! I have to push,” Natalie wails. “I can’t stop.”

“You have to, it’s alright, everything’s alright, you’re about to birth baby’s head. We don’t want it coming out too fast or you’ll tear, just quick little breaths, squeeze that man’s hand as hard you need to.”

Natalie squeezes Phil’s hand so hard he’s convinced damage is being done, but he’ll take it. He’ll take it a thousand times over if it means he and Dan get a family and Natalie doesn’t suffer any more than she already has.

“That’s it, Natalie, well done!”

Phil sees the midwife reach up under Natalie’s gown and between her legs then and the incessant beeping that had been filling the room abruptly stops.

“What happened?” Phil asks, panic flooding his chest.

He looks at Dan, whose eyes are brimming with moisture.

“The head’s out,” the midwife says. “The cord was wrapped around the neck twice. The stronger the contractions got, the tighter it got. Everything’s fine now. I’ve unwrapped it. You’re all going to have a baby in a few minutes.”  

“Thank god,” Natalie sighs. Phil can’t breathe. The whiplash of emotions is all too much, all coming way too fast.

“You don’t have to count this time,” the midwife says to Phil. “In fact you can come down here and watch if you’d like.”

Phil looks at Natalie, who releases her grip on his hand and says, “God, yes, go. Hold Dan’s hand, he looks like he needs it. I’m fine now. The hard bit’s over.”

The midwife nods. “It is. She doesn’t even really need to push this time. The contraction will do the rest of the work.”

Phil walks around the bed to stand beside Dan, lacing their fingers together. Neither of them seem to have the capacity to form words for each other. Dan has managed to keep the tears at bay, though Phil knows they’re coming. Then he looks forward and sees the bloody, matted hair and blue-tinged skin of his child’s head and he feels something weighty settle in his chest. It’s such a jarring, violent sight, that head emerging from Natalie’s body, but it’s without a doubt the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen.

“Oh my god,” he whispers.

He feels the midwife rub his back gently. “I know. You’ll be alright, I promise.”

Dan squeezes his hand and the midwife says, “Ready, Natalie?” The head turns a little, and pushes forward. Shoulders emerge and then suddenly, the midwife’s gloved hands are holding his baby—his tiny, slippery, beet-red, screaming baby.

“Oh my fucking god,” he hears Dan croak beside him. “Oh my fucking god.”

“Well done, Natalie, well done,” the midwife coos, before looking at Phil. “Congratulations, daddies. It’s a girl.”

Phil manages to tear his eyes off the unbelievable image before him for a moment and turns them to Dan, who is crying now, and not sweet, happy little tears of joy, but violent, wracking sobs that shake his whole body _._ He crouches down and buries his face in his hands. Phil turns his head back to watch the midwife lean forward and place the squirming little lady on Natalie’s chest. Another midwife comes over with a clean white towel and starts rubbing the baby’s head and body, cleaning her off and making her howl.

Phil crouches down beside Dan and wraps his arms around his shoulders, pulling him back up to stand. He squeezes tightly. “We have a baby girl, Dan.”

Dan nods, sobbing into Phil’s shoulder, staining his navy blue button-down with relief and awe and joy.

“Who wants to cut the cord?”

Dan looks up at Phil with red, puffy eyes—pleading eyes. “Go on,” Phil says smiling. Dan takes the strange-looking scissors with a trembling hand that the midwife guides to the thick grey cord that still attaches his daughter to Natalie’s body. It takes him three goes to cut all the way through.

One of the midwives picks up the baby and takes her over to a corner of the room. “Just have to run some quick tests and get her all fixed up.”

Natalie’s oxygen mask has been removed, and she’s sat up a little higher in the bed, beaming. “Congratulations, boys. We did it.”

“You did it,” Phil says warmly. “You were amazing.”

“It’s not over yet,” one of the midwives says then. “She still has to birth the placenta.”

Phil elbows Dan in the ribs, giggling. “Placenta,” he snickers, memory flashing back to all those years ago when Dan was a teenager and placenta was one of his favourite words.

“Oh shut up, Phil.” Dan grins. “You’re a father now, you have to be more mature.”

“Oh shit, I forgot about the damned placenta,” Natalie frowns.

“It’s alright, it probably won’t be for another twenty minutes or so,” the midwife assures. “You have some time now to rest.”

“Who’s ready to hold their daughter?”

“You go,” Dan whispers.

Phil reaches out and the midwife places the tiny swaddled blue bundle in his arms, resting her little neck in the crook of his elbow. He’s shocked at how effortless it is, like she weighs nothing at all. He looks down at her perfect face in awe. Her skin is still cherry red and smooth as silk, her dark eyes open wide. They lock onto Phil’s and he feels the world all around him come crashing down. He knows in an instant that life, as he’s known it, is over. The tiny little face that looks up at him is at once completely new and incredibly familiar. He leans down and presses his lips softly against her forehead, breathing in her delicious, intoxicating scent. It’s indescribable, the way it floods his senses and fills him with a deep, painful, soul-shattering love.

Dan is stood beside him. He reaches over and strokes his finger against the shock of soft, fine black hair atop her head.

“She looks just like you,” Phil murmurs, and finally a tear of his own rolls down his cheek. “She’s perfect.”

“What’s her name?” Natalie asks, shaking them both out of their reverie.

Phil looks at Dan, who nods his head.

He looks back down at his daughter and smiles. “Her name is River.”

**Author's Note:**

> waveydnp on tumblr :)


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